So there I was visiting an out of town dojo for the fifth time in as many weeks and there he was again. We'll call him funky grandmaster, for he introduced himself as a grandmaster and told me about all these katas and 6000 techniques he knew. He did have the tatoos to fit, dragon on the right forearm tiger on the left. Come on let's spar, he insisted as he'd done every week.OK funky grand master where, when? After class fine, you sure, ok. He lunged at me with his long hair flailing ,all I did was a simple sidestep followed by a blow on the back of the neck and he's down ...three times in a row. Wow I'm really impressed funky. The third time he looked up at me (a mere 2nd dan with 12 yrs exp. mind you certainly no grandmaster)from the dojo floor and said "I'm not letting you do that again" guess what he went down the exact same way.

You know the really scary part of this story is over 25 years ago I knew an individual who had tatoo's like you described on his arm. Perhaps the same individual, perhaps not. But in this time they could have become a grandmaster, they certainly would not be alone in that, isnt' almost everyone one these days?

Alas I'm not one as my definition of master is they have to be dead 25 years and somebody has to still remember their name to be a master, and for grandmaster make it 50 years.